Indigenous Peoples Documents

The indigenous peoples of North America sent some 180 delegates,
including more than a dozen recognized elders, to share ideas on the
impact of climate change to the "Circles of Wisdom. Native
Peoples/Native Homelands Climate Change Workshops" sponsored by NASA.
The following is a condensed version of their common statement, "The
Albuquerque Declaration," which was later tabled at the Conference of
the Parties Four at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, November 2-13, 1998.

As indigenous peoples, we are to begin each day with a prayer, bringing
our minds together in thanks for every part of the natural world. We are
grateful that each part of our natural world continues to fulfil the
responsibilities set for it by our Creator, in an 'unbreakable
relationship to each other. As the roles and responsibilities are
fulfilled, we are allowed to live our lives in peace. We are grateful for
the natural order put in place and regulated by natural laws.

Mother Earth, Father Sky, and all of Creation, from micro-organisms to
human, plant, trees, fish, bird, and animal relatives are part of the
natural order and regulated by natural laws. Each has a unique role and is
a critical part of the whole that is Creation. Each is sacred, respected,
and a unique living being with its own right to survive, and each plays an
essential role in the survival and health of the natural world.

Because of our relationship with the lands and waters of our natural
surroundings, which have sustained us since time immemorial, we carry
knowledge and ideas that the world needs today. We know how to live with
this land: we have done so for thousands of years.

We express profound concern for the well being of our sacred Mother
Earth and Father Sky and the potential consequences of climate imbalance
for our indigenous peoples and the significance of these consequences for
our communities, our environment, our economies, our cultures and our
relationships to the natural order and laws. A growing body of Western
scientific evidence now suggests what indigenous peoples have expressed
for a long time: life as we know it is in danger.

We can no longer afford to ignore the consequences of this evidence. In
June 1997, more than 2,000 U.S. scientists, from over 150 countries,
including Nobel Laureates, signed the Scientists Statement on Global
Climate Disruption which reads, in part, the "accumulation of
greenhouses gases commits the sacred Earth irreversibly to further global
climate change and consequent ecological, economic, social and spiritual
disruption" (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, December
1995). Climate imbalance will cause the greatest suffering to the
indigenous peoples and most pristine ecosystems globally. According to
this overwhelming consensus of international scientists, the burning of
oil, gas, and coal (fossil fuels) is the primary source of human-induced
climate change.

The increasing effects of the indiscriminate use of fossil fuels adds
to other adverse impacts on natural forests. Natural forests are critical
parts of the ecosystems that maintain global climate stability. The mining
and drilling for coal, oil, and gas, as well as other mineral extractions,
results in substantial local environmental consequences, including severe
degradation of air, forests, rivers, oceans and farmlands. Fossil fuel
extraction areas are home to some of Mother Earth's last and most
vulnerable indigenous populations, resulting in accelerated losses of
biodiversity, traditional knowledge, and ultimately in ethnocide and
genocide.

For the future of all the children, for the future of Mother Earth and
Father Sky, we call upon the leaders of the world, at all levels of
governments, to accept responsibility for the welfare of future
generations. Their decisions must reflect their consciousness of the
responsibility and they must act on it.

We request that the potential consequences of climate imbalance for
indigenous peoples and our environment, economies, culture, place and role
in the natural order be addressed by:

Establishing and funding an Inter-sessional Open-ended Working Group
for indigenous peoples within the Conference of the parties of the UN
Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Provisions for case studies be established within the framework of
that Working Group that would allow for assessing how climate change
affect different regions of indigenous peoples and local communities,
assessing climate changes on flora and fauna, freshwater and oceans,
forestry, traditional agricultural practices, medicinal plants and
other biodiversity that impact subsistence and land-based cultures of
indigenous peoples, and other case studies that would provide a
clearer understanding of all effects and impacts of climate change and
warming upon indigenous peoples and local communities.

Indigenous participation. Indigenous peoples of North America were
invited by neither the United States nor Canada to participate in the
negotiations of the United Nations Convention on Climate Change. We
demand a place at the table of this important international
discussion.

Indigenous peoples have the right, responsibility and expertise to
participate as equal partners at every level of decision-making including
needs assessments, case studies, within national and international
policy-making activities concerning climate change impacts, causes and
solutions. They need to help establish protocols that would actively
promote international energy efficient and sustainable forms of
development, including the widespread use of appropriately scaled solar
energy and renewable energy technologies as well as sustainable
agricultural and forestry practice models; exploration and development in
the traditional territories of indigenous peoples of the world must be
done with the full consent of indigenous peoples, respecting their right
to decline a project that may adversely impact them. Where destruction has
already occurred, there should be a legally binding obligation to restore
all areas already affected by oil, gas, and coal exploration,. This
restoration must be done such that indigenous peoples an continue
traditional use of their lands.